Jack Santos

A long time ago when I was a programmer trainee, my friend  Ken <last name to remain anonymous> and I were in a company meeting.  We sat together listening to a diatribe of “here’s what’s happening” from company management, which ended with “that’s how we see it”.  Ken got up in from the crowd and [...]

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Category: career CIO issues Strategic Planning Uncategorized     Tags: career, CIO, culture, gearheads, IT relevance, management, Strategy

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Even though I am an American of Portuguese descent, this week’s Economist cover was jarring.  In one simple graphic, they captured what is happening in our world, or at least in this hemisphere. I have relatives in Brazil, and my heritage passed through there on the way to the USA  over a hundred years ago.  [...]

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Like many of my Gartner colleagues, I get inundated daily with requests from publicists.  They want to get on my radar, help me see the “Next Big Thing” before anyone else, get me introduced to the “In Crowd”.  I used to feel guilty about not replying to publicists, or public relation folks, or analyst relations [...]

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Probably one of the biggest growth areas for staff ( in most organizations) has been around data analytics. The IT corollary has been the purchase and installation of data warehouses. What a surprise the other day when in a discussion with  data management colleagues I was told “Forget Data Warehousing – that is so 90s!” [...]

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In another classic example of the consumer’s effect on IT, the New York Times reported on the struggle consumers are going through for book reading.  I relate all too well.  I have been agonizing for months now on whether to purchase a Kindle (or one of the cheaper alternatives such as from Barnes and Noble), [...]

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I have to admit that I, like many others, have struggled with Facebook. How much should I participate? Should I friend my boss, co-workers, subordinates?  Should I talk to my kids about their activities on Facebook?  How much should I share, and with whom? Is it a replacement for LinkedIn? If you believe Mark Zuckerberg, [...]

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One of the things we have to deal with in IT and in management is the prospect of unintended consequences.  We (CIOs, CxOs, etc) try to think through possibilities: new markets, new tactics, new business models.  Be we also are cognizant of (or should be, in many instances) of the potential for things to happen [...]

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This just in: http://www.suasnews.com/2010/08/587/wi-fi-aerial-surveillance-platform-wasp/. Or the (supposed) headline: Hackers create WIFI drone.  A  little further clicking leads to the group’s website: http://www.diydrones.com/. Seems that the media loves the term “hackers” – fear sells.   I suppose that in the current climate I would have been under the same scrutiny as Google street-view, when I was a [...]

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Had a discussion yesterday with a client in a large (30K person) organization about the work at home trend.  Smaller companies (such as Gartner) have gone site-less (most analysts work out of their home).  Larger companies consider work-at-home policy to be, generally, “work from home if you want, but don’t make it a habit”.  Work-at-home [...]

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I’m speaking at Gartner’s Catalyst Conference in San Diego this week.  For all you Gartner aficionados, you may be familiar with Gartner’s premier Symposium – held in October in Orlando (as well as other venues in the world).  When Burton was bought, we brought with us the Burton (now Gartner) Catalyst Conference. The difference between [...]

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